ISU colleges are working hard to prepare for the budget cuts starting in July.

The state appropriations cut of $15.7 million from Iowa State’s operating budget will affect all areas of the school.

Interim President Richard Seagrave said each college’s operating budget could see cuts between 3 to 4 percent.

“There’s not a lot of difference between the cuts for each college and we’re still working through this,” Seagrave said. “But my main concern is protecting undergraduate education.”

Seagrave said a total of approximately 160 faculty and staff will be eliminated.

“With less faculty everyone will have to work a little harder and pick up some slack here and there,” he said.

Thomas Hill, vice president for Student Affairs, said although the Student Affairs office will see a $300,000 cut, financial aid will not be targeted.

“We’ve got a game plan we’re looking at for services we feel we can do without that will have the least overall impact,” he said. “I think everyone is working together on this and I’m very pleased that President Seagrave has made it possible to continue to provide aid to students without cutting that.”

The College of Agriculture is prioritizing its programs, said Dean Richard Ross.

“It is difficult for the college to adjust to these things, but we’re trying to do our part,” he said.

College of Family and Consumer Sciences Dean Carol Meeks said CFCS is working to maintain undergraduate programs.

“We’ve cut vacant lines, two of them being faculty lines, and we did a major reorganization last year and had some funds leftover,” she said. “We’re using those funds to help with the cuts.”

The College of Design wants to keep its student services, particularly for incoming students and advisers despite its cut, said Mark Engelbrecht, dean of the Design College.

“We had to reorganize the upper-level offerings in our programs and in our departments,” he said. “Fewer courses will be offered in a different way, such as a studio going to a lecture.”

The college will have to depend on existing faculty and some temporary assistants to make all of the courses available, he said.

“We haven’t had to let anyone go, but it’s been a real challenge,” Engelbrecht said.

Labh Hira, senior associate dean of the Business College, said the college will be affected mostly in its faculty positions.

“It has definitely impacted the faculty we would have hired,” he said. “There are three positions we could not fill.”

Hira said he hopes the 6 percent budget cut is only a one-year phenomena.

The cut will affect classes in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, said Dean Peter Rabideau.

“We’re certainly attempting to have classes available for students,” he said. “Some will be larger and faculty will be taking on a heavier load.”

Some recitation sections may be removed, he said.

“We’re also doing some prioritizing within our courses, such as which ones are most important,” Rabideau said. “We have a situation where we teach a lot of courses that basically all of the students at the university take for basic education requirements.”

College of Engineering Dean James Melsa said the college will not be terminating any current faculty. Instead some remodeling projects may be postponed.

“Our focus is to not do something that may not be reversible,” he said.

The Veterinary Medicine College Dean Norman Cheville said the cut will affect research programs in the college.

“In those areas we’ll encourage the application for research grants,” Cheville said. “Beyond that major area, we’re reducing some administrative costs.”

Cheville said he feels the college has dealt with the budget cuts effectively but it has come at the expense of their research contribution.

“Any further reductions required will be very serious indeed,” he said.